


Bryn Myrddin

by ariadnes_string



Category: Arthurian Mythology, Camelot (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-23
Updated: 2012-12-23
Packaged: 2017-11-22 02:30:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/604825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariadnes_string/pseuds/ariadnes_string
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I think it is you who is the sorcerer,” said Merlin. “Would you seduce me, Vivien?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bryn Myrddin

**Author's Note:**

  * For [starrystarrynight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/starrystarrynight/gifts).



> Dear starrystarrynight, I hope you'll forgive me for bring together two characters who barely speak in canon; I wanted to explore what might happen to their part of the legend in the context of _Camelot_.
> 
> a/n: The story takes place after 1x10, the series finale.  
> a/n: I apologize for skating so lightly over the rich history of medieval Africa. What I have here is about as historically accurate as the show.  
> a/n: The title means "Merlin's Hill," and is the name of one of the places where he is supposed to sleep until he wakes again.  
> a/n: thank you to dogpoet for the beta!

Merlin had thought to make better time, but a wave of weariness hit him whilst he was still traversing the barren hills beyond Camelot. The exhaustion was so overwhelming that he thought at first it might be a spell. But he could smell no magic, and concluded that recent events had simply drained him more than he knew. He hadn’t slept since Igraine’s death, or eaten either. The damp under the trees weighed on him like lead.

No matter. He was in no hurry to do anything except erase the details of her death from his mind. There was a nearby cave he had used before, and he had the means to achieve his goal in his pack.

So tired was he, however, that he was nigh on the cave’s entrance before he noticed the firelight spilling from its mouth.

He stumbled to a halt. Brigands who would think nothing of murdering a hapless traveller roamed these hills. As he stood there hesitating, a voice called to him from behind the firelight.

“Come closer, Merlin.” The accent was both familiar and unique. “I will not harm you.”

His hand flew to the knife at his belt, but he did not back away. “Morgan’s woman. What do you here?” 

“Vivien,” she corrected. He could make out a figure now, beckoning him from the cave’s entrance. “Morgan’s woman no longer. Only a traveller seeking refuge from the weather. One who has grown weary of the ways of kings and queens. One, perhaps, like yourself.”

He laughed and released the knife. It was as good a way as any to explain what troubled him. 

“Come in,” she said. “The rain will be here soon.”

She was right. The wind had risen, whipping and twisting the leaves until they showed their bellies to the sky. His instinct was to believe her. The meeting seemed too random to be one of Morgan’s schemes. And if he was wrong? Well, he had given up his dreams of a glorious death years ago.

The cave was warmer than he would’ve thought possible after the chill of the forest. Vivien had placed something aromatic in the flames, and the scent thickened the air. Merlin couldn’t identify it. He did not protest when she took his heavy cloak and pack and urged him closer to the fire.

“I don’t have much,” she said, handing him a hunk of bread and a piece of cheese. “But enough to share.”

He had provisions of his own, but he was more curious than hungry. “Has she released you, then, your lady?”

“No.” Vivien smiled, small and bitter. The flickering light made her tattoos seem to dance over the dark skin of her face. “And there will be a price on my head as soon as she finds I’ve gone. I have stolen my freedom: the legal term of my indenture will not be up for many years. And you, has your king released you from your service?”

It was Merlin’s turn to make a rueful face. “I gave him no choice. He will do well enough without me, and Camelot.” He let the word hang in the heavy air for a moment. “Camelot became too much to bear.”

He could feel himself flushing, something damp on his cheeks that could have been sweat or tears. How had she raised such a heat amid the damp stones? He looked around, half expecting braziers, but the edges of the space were lost in shadow. He tugged at the neck of his tunic, hoping for a breath of air against his skin.

He startled when she laid a hand on his arm, but she was only offering him a wineskin. 

“You are grieving,” she said. “I understand. I grieve too. Morgan had no right to shed that blood. I lost my mistress when she set herself on that path, just as you lost your lover.”

He dragged a sleeve across his face and took a long pull of wine. It was spiced—its taste as unfamiliar as the scent in the fire. But it restored him to himself enough to speak.

“Where will you go now?” he asked. “A wanted woman.”

“I am headed for the coast, to find passage on an ocean-going ship. Perhaps you can teach me a spell of invisibility, sorcerer, so I can travel unmolested.” She seemed almost invisible already, in the shifting light of the cave: only a glint of gold earrings, a flash of burnished silk, a glimpse of white teeth as she spoke.

"I must disappoint you there," he said. "I have forsworn magic.” He found, with some surprise, that his words were true. His magic, for once, lay as quiescent within him as a drowsing cat. "Where will you go in this ship?” he asked. 

“I have decided that I have sojourned here in slavery long enough. I would return to the land of my ancestors.” The light caught her face as she spoke, limning the breadth of her cheekbones, the proud tilt of her skull.

“And where is that?” His curiosity had returned. He had met others of her hue, traders, and wanderers like himself, learned men and warriors. They came from the far south, he knew, a land of kingdoms, each more wondrous than the last. But he had met no other who bore markings like Vivien’s.

She smiled at his interest, her face softening. She settled herself near him and gazed into the flames. Her voice was like an incantation. “In my family, we have always called our home Mapangubwe. I do not know if it still bears that name. A great kingdom, my grandparents said, trading in gold and ivory. They worshiped Mwari, the creator, and the name of their city meant ‘Homestead of Stone.’”

“I should like to see that city,” he said without thinking.

She brushed his shoulder with her own. At some point, she’d shed her heavy embroidered tabard; he could feel the warmth of her skin through her fine linen under-dress. “Come with me, then”

“Would you have a former sorcerer as your lackey, mistress?” It was a more tempting offer than he would've thought.

“My comrade, Merlin, never my lackey. Come: we will visit Carthage and Mogadishu and Timbuktu. We will see the palaces of the Caliphs. They say the learning of the Mohammedans is as lofty as their architecture. They say that in those cities there are whole markets devoted to the sale of books.”

Her words dizzied him. Or perhaps it was whatever herbs she had thrown in the fire—their odour was heavier now, the air harder to breathe. He was very conscious of her body next to his—compact, vigorous, strong. He drank again from the skin, but this time it failed to clear his head. 

“I think it is you who is the sorcerer,” he said. “Would you seduce me, Vivien?” He found himself only half resistant to the thought. Perhaps it would push back the thoughts of Igraine’s murder. Perhaps some of Vivien's surety of purpose would pass to him.

She laughed then, a ringing, open sound he was sure she’d never made in Morgan’s court. “No, Merlin. I have never desired congress with men. But I can give you something you need more: sleep deeper than any you can procure with this.” She held up the tincture of poppy he’d been saving for such time as life became unbearable. He wondered when she'd had time to search his pack. Her face drew very close to his, and her lips brushed his forehead. “It is one small spell I have, handed down among my people,” she said, and began to sing. 

Her words were soft, indistinct, and in a language he did not recognize. The flames seemed to spread with her song, twining over the roof of the cave like vines, sprouting flowers of crimson and ochre and gold. 

+++

For a while, he was warm in his dream, as warm as if he slept in one of Uther’s featherbeds before any of this trouble started. Then the cold crept in.

Igraine lay dying in his arms again, her skin cooling to marble as the blood left her body. This time, though, the marble seemed to build around them, like the walls of a tomb, trapping and chilling the air, stilling it even as her breath stilled.

He should escape, he thought vaguely, but he did not move, unwilling to shift her head from his lap. They said that dying of cold was a peaceful death, and so he felt now, heart slowing to silence, muscles turning to wood, thoughts fraying into nothingness.

+++

“Merlin,” someone said sharply. The voice was not Igraine’s, and he wanted to cry again for his loss. But the voice wouldn’t let him go, and now a hand joined it, shaking his shoulder hard. “You’ll catch your death sleeping on this cold earth.”

He rolled over and groaned. Then he forced himself to sit up. The gray light of morning filtered into the cave. Vivien stood between its mouth and the ashes of the fire, regarding him solemnly. She wore her embroidered tabard again, and a velvet coat. Gold shone in her ears and around her throat.

"I thought," he said, confused. "You--"

She laughed again, more confident even than the night before. A change was building in her, he could see, clothing her in power. "Men are always so suspicious. What reason would I have to do you harm, Merlin? I woke you only to ask whether we shall part ways now, or travel together as comrades." 

He stood. Despite the dreams her spell had brought, he found himself refreshed. The answer to her question seemed clear.

+++

“Does this place have a name?” Vivien asked as they left the cave.

“None that I know of. Perhaps they will name it for us.” He smiled a little at his joke. 

“I shall not be sorry to leave this dark land. I crave the sun,” she said, lifting her arms to its pale beams like a votary.

“Then let’s away,” he told her. 

They were three leagues distant before he realized he'd left his cloak behind. He decided he didn’t need it. They were bound for warmer climes.


End file.
